Mary McCarthy Quotes

A recluse without books and ink is already in life a dead man.

I can gabble on now, but I couldn't when I was a kid, so I spent a lot of time in my own head on the moors by myself. It felt like writing was the right way to express myself.

Writing has always allowed me to escape. I was a very lonely child. Because I was very socially awkward, I would always have trouble making friends. And so reading and writing allowed me to have friends and to have an active imaginary life that really sort of kept me sane.

My room for books and study or for sitting and thinking about nothing in particular to see what would happen was at the end of a hall.

The primary distinction of the artist is that he must actively cultivate that state which most men, necessarily, must avoid; the state of being alone.

As an only child lacking siblings and playmates, I was alone a great deal of the time. Much of this was spent reading virtually anything I could get my hands on.

Mostly, I just want to be in my house reading and writing.

Normally, I just sit in my quiet little room and do the small things that bring me pleasures. I read my books, I answer email, I write a little bit.

I don't have many friends. It's not because I'm a misanthrope. It's because I'm reserved. I'm self-contained. I get all my adventures in my head when I'm writing my books.

I have a huge, active imagination, and I think I'm really scared of being alone; because if I'm left to my own devices, I'll just turn into a madwoman.

I've spent my life alone in a room with a typewriter.

I was an only child until I was 14, and there were no other kids around the area really. So I spent a lot of time on my own in the fields or by the lake, with just my imagination for company. I suppose I never wanted to let that part of me go.

I would advise you to write, my dear friend, because with your active nature, solitude is simply intolerable to you, and after some time your solitude would become perhaps attractive if you were to people it with creatures of your own fancy.

Music was like my first real toy. I was an only child for a while, and I was alone a lot of the time - and I liked it. I still like being alone.

I do, indeed, close my door at times and surrender myself to a book, but only because I can open the door again and see a human face looking at me.

Solitude is as needful to the imagination as society is wholesome for the character.

Creating is a lonely thing in a lot of ways.

I get caught up in my bubble of reading, writing, or music.

Solitude begets whimsies.

I got in touch with the creative process between the age of 14 and 16, mainly because I was alone so much.

I had a lot of alone time with no brothers or sisters running around, or anything. I would just sit and imagine things, all the time.

Growing up a lonely only child prepared me for the years of solitude spent as a writer; years spent in the company of people who don't exist, imaginary people you have conversations with. It's a paid form of madness, this writing stuff.

Books support us in our solitude and keep us from being a burden to ourselves.

I write to feel alone.

Writing is an amazing place to hide, to go into the rabbit hole, and pull the trap door down over your head.